Against the brain's better judgment...

[warriorscribe]

Characters: Enoch and anyone (except for one where it's closed to Lucifel and maybe his roommates too)
Setting: Outside room 1-12(closed to Lucifel and maybe his roommates), Floor 2, various
Format: I'm starting in prose but I'll match!
Summary: Enoch has something to give his guardian, and then it's time for his collar checkup. And he'd been promised to have memories returned to him re: his little hiatus trip.
Warnings: Repressed memories are repressed for a reason. Maybe mentions of death, trauma, mention of suicide attempt

Dorm Floor 1

Enoch had returned here after a visit to the mail room, where he'd found two boxes of chocolate, one of them for Lucifel. Tohko sure did take easily to people...he supposed he should be glad for that much, the last thing he wanted was tension between his friends. He stopped outside the room with Lucifel's name on its plate and knocked on the door, hoping Lucifel had slept late too. He'd been either nearly missing or completely missing breakfast, himself, ever since going to Meridian...

...oh, that reminded him, he'd have to go to the infirmary for his collar checkup after this.


Infirmary

The drones had to push him out of the room. Enoch wandered back out into the waiting room, his arms folded tightly. He shook as he picked through the now perfectly clear memories. Of waking beside a corpse. Of wandering under a vileness-red sky, and burying Asato, burying Sissel, burying Ashraf and Michael, and his collapse thereafter, his empty plea to the second level, burying Armaros in the sea(and trying and failing to join him), and the moment it really dawned on him - he was utterly alone. Isolated.

He made his shaky way back to the stairs, nearly running into things and people on his way there. He didn't know where he was going, but he couldn't stand still.

Anywhere else

The tower was much larger now, but Enoch was making his aimless way up the stairs anyway. Not even his usual resting floors, the eleventh and twenty fifth, were stops. He kept his head down, his face tear-stained.

He had forgotten them for a reason. It was intensely painful, recalling those moments of discovering corpses that should not be, interring an immortal's corpse in the sea. They, especially Armaros, they were never meant to leave him, Meridian was supposed to be safe, he had been trying to keep it so. And that soul-rending pain of being utterly isolated, having no one, mortal or otherwise...

...But he had wanted to remember for a reason, hadn't he? He paused where he was on the stairs to the eighteenth floor and looked out at the tables as if he'd never seen them before. So what was important about it that he'd forgotten?

He continued to climb and reflect. And, naturally, not watch where he was going.

Comments

Outside the Infirmary

[godheals]

Raphael was curious about a few words and their definitions, so he had slipped out of the infirmary for a moment to look them up in the libraries. It took a little while, but eventually, he found what he needed and headed back..only to find Enoch being pushed out of the infirmary. He didn't quite know what was going on..but being in the infirmary usually meant that someone wasn't well, unless they were getting collar check-ups.

"Enoch, are you alright?"

[warriorscribe]

Raphael may have noticed it was the checkup day for blue collars. But the angel could be forgiven for thinking he was sick, with his face drawn and his movements slow and heavy, with his eyes on some distant point beyond the floor.

When Raphael speaks, he stops and looks at him for a long moment, his expression disturbed and far away.

"...Raphael, were you at the gathering our hosts announced?"

[godheals]

He may have noticed, but collar check-ups did not leave one in such a state..at least, in Raphael's experience. However..that expression did not look good, even if Raphael did not know why Enoch was wearing it or where it had come from.

"I was not. What happened there?"

[warriorscribe]

"Questions were answered, mostly about the new visitors....and I asked Jason to restore my memories of my return to Meridian."

Enoch shifts uneasily, from one foot to the other, his eyes flick somewhere off to the side for a moment, and his lips tighten. His grip on his own forearms tightens a little too, indentations in the tops of his gloves pronounced.

[godheals]

...Oh dear. While Raphael hadn't seen Meridian, he remembered what he felt when he looked into those viewfinders. While his empathy was still growing, he could understand what Enoch was feeling here.

At least, so he thought.

"Enoch..I am sorry that you saw that..but..what do you remember of your return?"

[warriorscribe]

"Everything." Enoch swallowed heavily, took a restless step forward. "Let's walk, I can't stand still."

[godheals]

Raphael nodded and started to move forward with Enoch. He wasn't quite sure how to help in a situation like this..but he had failed his role, failed his duties, and failed Enoch before when he hadn't spoke up or managed to help when he was suffering.

Even though God was destroyed, he would not allow himself to fail again. He would do all he could.

"..What specifically, then?"

[warriorscribe]

Enoch glanced over at Raphael, the deathgrip on his arms relaxing a bit as he walked with him.

It was still several flights of stairs before Enoch began to speak. "...It was...as if I'd woken from a dream. Everything was exactly as it was when I left. Except..."

[godheals]

"Except the people that had been in that world were dead."

..Sadly, Raphael didn't know that Armaros and Enoch had shared a house together. If he had, then he might have tried to use a bit more tack with that statement.

Dorm Floor 1

[brbtalkingtogod]

For those who haven't seen Lucifel in the morning before, the Archangel spent most of his mornings in his room to get clean and do his hair. The whole procedure took the time most would use to have breakfast. Ever since he had to eat, he got his own... scent. And he knows better than to run around without showering every few days at least. Archangel or not, he had made enough trips through time and the earth to know that much.

Enoch is lucky to find him at his room right after he had showered. However, his hair was still damp and not in its usual spiky form yet. "Ah, morning Enoch. What brings you here?"

Re: Dorm Floor 1

[warriorscribe]

It was a little strange, seeing Lucifel like that. But not necessarily a bad kind of strange. It was...more approachable, in a way, though he'd never tell Lucifel that.

He handed Lucifel Tohko's box of chocolates for him along with the message she'd written. "Tohko left these for us in my mailbox. I'm not surprised you've met her already," he added with a small smile.

[brbtalkingtogod]

He would prefer not being seen like this by others. Or at least that Enoch would keep to himself how he has seen the Archangel just now. He's a bit vain when it comes to his appearance. Even if such a thing actually shouldn't matter to him.

Lucifel tilted his head and took the box and note from Enoch. "Yeah, I met her just recently..." His eyes quickly scanned the note. "Huh."

[warriorscribe]

"She can be...ah...overeager to help at times." Enoch knew that what she claimed to be able to help with often tended to be beyond her grasp. It was like the day she promised to be his anchor - one can't just claim those things for themselves, after all.

[brbtalkingtogod]

"And a bit too curious as it seems." Lucifel got a taste of what Tohko is like. But he hadn't expected that she would be calling him a 'friend' after meeting her just once.

[warriorscribe]

"There's nothing wrong with her curiosity. She simply hasn't learned how to properly use it." It just comes with a lack of boundaries, in other words.

[brbtalkingtogod]

"It's close to being nosy." Curiosity isn't a bad thing, but too much could be dangerous, for humans and angels all the same. Both of them had seen that in the past.

[warriorscribe]

"She herself said she was never taught to pry into other peoples' matters."

Another helpless sort of smile. "I don't think she took my words on it to heart."

[crouching_sin]

Naoya had been heading towards the infirmary, but as he saw Enoch exiting he decided to change his goal for the moment. He walked up behind the other, reaching out to steady him.

"Careful."

[warriorscribe]

Enoch started at the movement behind him, his eyes filled with fear and pain, a hint of madness somewhere in there deep before vanishing into the mist of tears welling up.

If Naoya was at the little gathering the admins had called, he might know what had happened.

[crouching_sin]

He sighed, and reached up, putting a hand on Enoch's shoulder.

"Let's go... somewhere else."

Time to be the responsible adult in this situation. He'd get him somewhere he could calm down enough, hopefully without making a scene.

[warriorscribe]

Going somewhere else was all that was on Enoch's mind to begin with. He just wanted to keep moving and never stand still. Problem was, he wasn't looking. He nodded, keeping close to Naoya, wherever they'd go.

[crouching_sin]

He pulled the other to lean on him a bit, walking up the stairs with them. The library should have a quiet place, at least.

[warriorscribe]

At least people couldn't be yelling at terminals right now. Enoch didn't mind being guided to lean on Naoya, moving slowly. The memories were so sharp it was painful. It was like they'd only happened hours ago... That was probably the entire point - it had been more or less what he'd asked for. He hadn't forgotten it was for a reason that he'd asked, but...it was hard to figure out what it was that was so important he'd face the pain of this again.

[crouching_sin]

He led Enoch over to a more secluded part of the library, and directed him to sit in a chair.

"Tell me what happened."

Sorry for being so slow with this...

[warriorscribe]

"I...asked to have the memories of returning to Meridian returned," he said in a soft, faint voice that held back tears.

His head stayed down, eyes obscured by his hair as he sat as directed. He was shaking from forcing himself to relive the memory of the moments that had become blurred, searching for what could possibly be important and desperate to find it before he forgot again.